


Breakfast Deferred

by Skyler10



Series: Family Fic [7]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Birthday, Daddy Doctor, Domestics, F/M, Fluff, Kid Fic, Pete's World Torchwood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-29
Updated: 2016-05-29
Packaged: 2018-07-11 01:08:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7018795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyler10/pseuds/Skyler10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tentoo and Rose get up early to surprise their daughter on the morning of her third birthday with her favorite waffles, but those plans get delayed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Breakfast Deferred

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by TPP’s “breakfast” prompt. Pure maple syrupy fluff. Little kid fic but also romance and Torchwood office stuff and slightly Teen at the end for suggesting “grown-up” things. *wink

The Terrible Twos hadn’t been as awful as advertised, but the Doctor and Rose were more than happy to celebrate the end of this year in their daughter’s life. Lately Piper had been throwing fewer tantrums over things like sweets in Tescos and bedtime and wrinkly socks. She had even made friends at the Torchwood Tots onsite nursery school on the days she wasn’t with Jackie. So it was karma, really, that her third birthday began with tears and all-out screaming.

“DADDYYYYYY!” a tiny voice shrieked from her bed.

In the kitchen, her parents jumped apart, startled in the midst of flirty light kisses while waiting for the wafflemaker.

“I’ll be right back,” the Doctor promised with a peck to Rose’s forehead.

 Over the past three years, Rose had learned to tell her child’s cries apart. This was somewhere between scared and lonely. Nightmare, if she had to guess. Still, she subconsciously counted the minutes as she continued preparing breakfast.

A loud BEEP BEEP BEEP from her mobile sent her heart racing once more. Just a text from work, but she had left her mobile’s volume up so it sounded more alarming than it was. Wiping her batter-covered fingers off on a tea towel, she read the message:

**URGENT: Team TimeWolf needed at HQ for backup. Be prepped for processing and registration of a captured hostile in the interrogation room in one hour.**

 

Rose sighed and slouched in defeat. She and the Doctor were planning on taking a short workday today to get ready for Piper’s party tomorrow. What had she been thinking telling her mother she didn’t need help? Now she’d have to push back the conference call with Berlin about the mysterious purple slime popping up all over Europe’s capital cities… The schedule for the day ran through her head. They could still be off in time to take Piper to the summer funfair, however. They’d promised to go for her birthday. Rose was dedicated to the family business and defending the universe, but she would _not_ break a promise to her daughter.

Speaking of, the calm in her bond with the Doctor and the silence in the rest of the house were a good sign (she hoped), but breakfast was ready. She turned off the wafflemaker and set off to see what the birthday girl and her ever-patient father were up to.

* * *

As soon as the Doctor had entered the pink and yellow room, the shouting turned to straight sobbing. His heart still broke to see his daughter’s red, wet, snotty little face scrunched up in distress.

“Hey there, Princess. What’s wrong?”

“Daddyyyy!”

“Yeah, baby? What is it?” He sat down next to her on the toddler bed and rubbed her back, slowing her sobs to little sniffles.

“N-n-nofing.” Wide, teary eyes just as deep chocolate as his peered up at him, framed by bedhead tangles the same dark blonde as her mother’s natural color.

“Can I hold you?” he asked, wary of her spontaneously kicking legs. “Want a cuddle with Daddy?”

“Noooo,” she replied between shuddered breaths. “I’mma big girl.” Despite this claim, she barely hesitated a second before climbing into his open arms and settling in his lap. He scooted back to lean against the wall. His legs stuck out awkwardly over the edge of the small bed, but he didn’t pay them any mind.

“Why, here’s Paddington!” he pulled the worn bear out from under her pillow at his side. “Think Paddington needs a cuddle too? Maybe he had a nightmare. Is that it?”

“No.” Piper snuggled into his chest, clutching Paddington and leaving wet streaks from her tears and running nose all over his sleepshirt. Still, he held her tighter and kissed her hair.

After a few minutes, their little moment came to an end as he realized they were being watched.

The Doctor met his wife’s adoring gaze with a small smile.

“Everything alright in here?” she asked. She didn’t wait for an answer before joining them on the small bed.

“Mummy, are you making me waffles?” The tear-stained face lifted and turned to Rose.

“Hey, that was supposed to be a surprise!” she laughed. “Did Daddy tell you?”

“No, it’s my birthday. Waffles are for birthdays,” Piper stated as if it were a universal truth.

Her parents laughed, but she wasn’t getting off that easy.

“So what’s with the tears, love?” Rose asked gently, sweeping sticky hair off her daughter’s forehead. “Nightmare?”

“Big girls don’t have nightmares,” Piper answered before burying her head in the Doctor’s chest once more.

“Oh sweetheart, of course we do,” Rose reassured with a small laugh. “I get them too sometimes.”

“YOU get bad dreams?” She sniffled again and stared at her brave, beautiful heroine, then up at her father. “Mummy gets scared?”

“Sometimes, yeah.” Rose nodded.

“Wh-what do you do?”

“Same thing you did, really.”

“Hug your Daddy?”

Rose laughed again. “Well, that’s not what I meant, but yeah. More often though, I hug YOUR Daddy.”

“You’re a good hugger, Daddy,” Piper praised, patting the Doctor’s chest as he grinned at his girls.

“Why thank you.” 

“What was yours about then?” Rose prodded. “You can always tell us, you know. It’s ok to be scared.”

“I d’on know. I just needed Daddy.” She clutched tightly at the Doctor’s shirt, and he looked over her head at Rose.

“Oh I do I ever know what that’s like,” she murmured.

 _I’m sorry your dad couldn’t be there for you like this,_ the Doctor sent her telepathically through their bond. He dropped a hand from Piper’s back and threaded Rose’s fingers through his own.

 _Thanks, but I meant I know what it’s like needing you, missing you, wishing you were here to make the nightmares go away,_ she sent back.

“Well, I’m here now and forever,” the Doctor said aloud. “And I love you both so very much.”

“Love you too, Daddy. Mummy, can we have waffles now?”

Rose glanced over at the clock and shot up from the bed.

“Ohmygod, we have to go! I forgot to tell you,” she said to the Doctor with a sheepish lip bite. “We were called in early this morning. Looks like waffles are going in the freezer.”

“I’ll grab the bananas and cereal bars,” the Doctor volunteered.

To her credit, Piper accepted her on-the-go breakfast with minimal fussiness. Of course, it helped that she watched Rose put away the beloved waffles and eyed the freezer on the way out the door to make sure they didn’t try to sneak out and roll away.

* * *

Ten hours later and the Doctor was very near walking out of this epically long meeting even though Rose was leading it. Well, leading it, as in she was the fourth speaker and the first three hadn’t been nearly as captivating. She had already practiced everything she was going to say with him over lunch, so he knew the strategy for finding out what had led the hostile aliens here _and_ the extra duties each team would take on this week like the back of his hand. He examined said back of hand now. More freckles. He really would have to start watching his sun exposure. Not unaffected by UV rays anymore. It showed other signs of aging too. This once would have affected him on a deeper emotional level, but at the moment it only served to remind him how long this meeting was taking. What was so hard to understand?  Rose was being perfectly clear. It was a fairly simple strategy, even for human brains to comprehend.

“Alright!” Rose’s change in tone awakened him from his daydreaming. “Now Pete’s going to come up and share about how this affects this month’s budget.”

The Doctor almost groaned audibly. He usually skipped out on any financial or administrative details and over the past several years had become an expert on avoiding such meetings. Even ones like this that included donuts left over from that morning.

 Rose sat down next to him and took his well-examined hand in hers. To an outsider, it looked like an office-appropriate display of affection. Which it was, but it was also a silent conversation.

 _What time is it?_ she asked, stroking her fingers up and down his open palm.

He squinted one eye in concentration.

_According to my very impressive alien sense of time… almost dinner._

_Cheeky. Seriously, we need to pick up Piper soon. The day care is going to close at 6._

_In 5 minutes and 32 and a half seconds then. At which point, they would bring her here, and then we’d have a much more entertaining meeting. I’m more worried about the funfair. We promised,_ he reminded her.

 _I know._ Rose sighed quietly enough that only he paid her any attention. _Why don’t you go get her and I’ll meet you after this is done? I’ll fill you in on anything you miss._ The twitch in the corner of her lips alerted him that perhaps he should reign in the delighted expression on his face.

 _You’re wonderful,_ he sent _._ One last squeeze of her hand and he tried to sneak out. Unfortunately, he bumped several chairs. The indignant looks of the executives who took everything too seriously and the startled looks of the agents who had been snoozing multiplied the comedy of the Doctor’s apologies.

“Sorry! Oh, sorry there. Excuse me.” He tripped twice but finally arrived at the door, with all eyes on him. He flushed and gave a little salute, which made Rose bite her lip harder. Once he was out of the room, she turned back to her blinking colleagues.

“What?! Waz happenin’?” Jake lifted his head from the table where he had been napping unnoticed until that moment.

Nope, she couldn’t hold it in any longer. A tiny snort escaped her before she burst out laughing. Luckily, everyone else followed her lead and found it just as amusing as she did. She closed her eyes and shook her head.

“I’m sorry ‘bout that,” she got out between giggles. “Sorry for the interruption, Dad. It’s just, the nursery school’s about to close and he needs to get Piper.”

“Blimey, how late have we gone?” Pete asked, clearly the only person in the room who had been fully engrossed in the proceedings through all four presenters.

“Well, my Time Lord told me it’s almost six. You really need to bring the clocks back in here, by the way.”

“They were a distraction,” he protested.

“They kept us on time,” she countered.

“Alright,” Pete surrendered. “Time to go, everyone. I’ll have Janet send a follow-up email in case there are further questions. Or in case you _forget_ between now and tomorrow.” He kicked Jake’s chair, who shrugged and tried to appear innocent. Jake’s angelic blue-eyed babyface let him get away with a lot, plus he was a damn good agent.

Rose narrowed her eyes and pointed a finger at him anyway. “We’ll talk tomorrow, Simmonds. I want your team’s help in this.”

He paled until he saw she was suppressing more laughter at his expense.

Pete watched this exchange with pride. _Not far from the tree indeed,_ he mused.

* * *

Downstairs, the Doctor wore the same fatherly smile and had the same thought. Piper had organized a campaign to save all of the toys from donation.

“Dad! Help me save them! They don’t want to go away!” she called as soon as she saw him enter the playroom.

“But sweetie,” a teacher’s aide urged. “We have more toys than we need here. And the kids down at the shelter don’t have a single one.”

“They don’t have ANY toys?!” Piper gasped at this terrible reality.

The young woman shook her head sadly. 

 “But that’s not fair! We have loads of toys!”

“Exactly,” the Doctor chimed in. “Which is why you and your friends need to help choose which ones to give away.”

The other kids happily threw stuffed animals in a box, unaware they were never going to see them again. Sometimes being a developmentally advanced part-Time Tot made life harder for the little girl.   

“Ok, kids, that’s enough for the donation box!” the head teacher called. “Thank you so much for helping. The homeless children are going to be so happy you shared with them.”

The innocent faces blinked up at their teacher, but Piper wasn’t satisfied.

“Daddy, are they going to be ok?” Piper asked as one of the older boys in the class came up next to her.

“The toys? Oh yes, they will be loved, I’m sure of it.”

“Those kids - they’re poor, righ’?” the boy asked. “They don’t have lots of stuff. Food and clothes and all tha’. My mum gave away my baby stuff because I don’t need it anymore and they do.”

Piper stared back and forth between the boy and her dad, speechless. The situation was more horrible than she could have imagined.

Tears entirely different than the variety that had spotted his shirt this morning ran onto the Doctor’s suit jacket as he lifted his daughter in his arms. He carried her out to the lobby where Rose was waiting for them.

“Everything alright?” Rose asked for the second time that day.

“Nooo!” Piper wailed. “Mummy! There are kids with NOTHING. No toys, or… or clothes, or bananas!”

“There was a donation box for the homeless shelter at school today,” the Doctor explained.

“Ah.” Rose nodded in sympathy. “This is oddly similar to a story Mum loves to tell about me at age six. Still haven’t lived that down. Guess I shoulda known it would happen earlier for her. Like everything else.”

“Mummy, can we give them my baby things? Dane gave them his baby things because he’s big and I’m big now too.”

Rose caught the Doctor’s expectant raised eyebrow and the twinkle in his eye, and her heart skipped a beat. They hadn’t talked about it too much, but there had been an understanding that they would try again. Some day.

“Not quite yet,” he answered for her. “We might not be done with them.”

Piper accepted this answer without asking what it meant, a fact for which Rose sighed in relief.

“C’mon, let’s get to that fair before it closes,” Rose urged and tugged at the Doctor’s free hand. 

\-----

They had snacked on fair food throughout the evening, but all three were hungry when they got home that night.

“Mummy, _now_ is it time for birthday waffles?” Piper asked, though no one had mentioned them since that morning.

“Sure, why not!” Rose grinned and proceeded to heat up three frozen homemade waffles while the Doctor poured them glasses of milk.

The family exchanged jokes and stories and plans for the weekend until all the waffles were gone and the birthday girl rubbed her drooping eyelids while protesting that she _really_ wasn’t tired at all. 

“I suggest a new tradition,” the Doctor whispered to Rose as they watched their sleeping part-Time Tot in her bed. “Birthday waffles at night.”

“It’s not going to get any less crazy around here in the mornings, is it?” Rose chuckled quietly.

“Especially not if we’re keeping her baby things,” he commented pointedly. “I gave the right answer earlier, right?”

“Mmm, that you did.”

“What do you say then? We did pretty good with the first one.”

“Yeah,” Rose relaxed against his side as the toddler-sized pink quilt rose and fell with their daughter’s steady breathing.

“Yeah as in, we want to do this having a baby thing again yeah?” He craned his neck down to read her mood.

“Yes.” Rose turned to face him for her answer, then pulled him out into the hallway, closing the door partway behind them. “I love her at this age, but today made me sad in a way. I’m _not_ going to miss the twos, but she’s not a baby anymore. I dunno… I think we could do it again, don’t you?”

“Well, it’d be different this time, having two.” He tugged an ear as they made their way down the hall. “Twice the work.”  

“You’re right,” she sighed seriously as they reached their bedroom. She stepped in front of him and broke into her signature playful grin. “Twice as many birthday waffles to make.”

“You’re ridiculous,” he laughed, but kissed her anyway.

“Hey, Super Dad?” She pulled away and caressed his cheek. “You rocked today. Seriously. I could never do this without you. I love you so much.”

“Funny because I was just thinking the exact same thing about you.”  

Kissing became snogging, snogging led to their bedroom door being shut and locked, which led to changing _out_ of their clothes but not _into_ pajamas,  which led to showing each other just how much they needed and wanted each other. They ignored the fact that Rose’s body wouldn’t be ready for serious trying for a few more weeks. After all, practice makes perfect. And as far as the Doctor was concerned, three years of experience told him a future full of little Roses was the very definition of perfection.

**Author's Note:**

> (p.s. If their daughter’s name sounds familiar, it’s because you’ve seen her a year or so out from this here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/5206583. More about her soon to come in future stories!)


End file.
